Astronomy & Space Exploration

For those interested, SpaceX are launching another satellite to GEO tonight. Basically, it's a 3.5ton satellite being sent really high to deliver coverage to south east asia.
The cool thing about it is that they'll attempt another barge landing, and because it's going to GEO(Geostationary orbit,35000km high or so) the speed it comes down is much faster than an LEO (low earth orbit) launch.
Also;
 
Crackers said:
For those interested, SpaceX are launching another satellite to GEO tonight. Basically, it's a 3.5ton satellite being sent really high to deliver coverage to south east asia.
The cool thing about it is that they'll attempt another barge landing, and because it's going to GEO(Geostationary orbit,35000km high or so) the speed it comes down is much faster than an LEO (low earth orbit) launch.
Also;
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Its been happening successfully quite often, that it isn't a big news anymore.

It will be interesting to see how the recovered rockets perform on their next trip. I think there is a plan to launch a recovered rocket in July, if I am right...
 
bleedred said:
Its been happening successfully quite often, that it isn't a big news anymore.

It will be interesting to see how the recovered rockets perform on their next trip. I think there is a plan to launch a recovered rocket in July, if I am right...
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Yeah i think that's the date. Theyve put some of them through static test fires and the results are quite promising. The big test will obviously be the first time they launch one commercially that was already used.
 
Crackers said:
Yeah i think that's the date. Theyve put some of them through static test fires and the results are quite promising. The big test will obviously be the first time they launch one commercially that was already used.
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Musk claims that it could be used with light refurbishments for about 100-200 further missions !!!!!!....

It would be extraordinary if they can get anywhere close to half of that...

I cannot believe why no other space agencies are getting on the same idea!!!!!
 
bleedred said:
Its been happening successfully quite often, that it isn't a big news anymore.

It will be interesting to see how the recovered rockets perform on their next trip. I think there is a plan to launch a recovered rocket in July, if I am right...
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I wouldn't say 4 times is quite often... although 3 times in a row is incredible.

There are still loads of "first times" for SpaceX to be super excited about
  • First Manned Space Flight
  • First Launch of a Reused Rocket
  • First Launch of a Falcon Heavy
Right now they've landed three in a row, but one will fail soon(er or later). We'll have to see how they will recover from that.
 
Will Absolute said:
How do you go from seeing the curvature of the earth to touchdown in a few seconds?:confused:
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Well, the amount of curvature you see has to do with the kind of lense they used, I believe. It's probably a less dramatic curvature, but they are clearly outside the atmosphere.

edit: WAIT! Youtube vid says "sped up"... I wanna see the original!
 
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Are people implying fake footage from Space X?

And MrMarcello, they themselves state in the youtube video that it's sped up.
 
Eriku said:
Are people implying fake footage from Space X?

And MrMarcello, they themselves state in the youtube video that it's sped up.
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Not implying it's fake but most images from the likes of NASA etc are CGI rather than real photos or videos which they admit themselves, so it would be good to see this Space X video in real time.
 
BringNaniBack said:
Not implying it's fake but most images from the likes of NASA etc are CGI rather than real photos or videos which they admit themselves, so it would be good to see this Space X video in real time.
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I knew they enhanced them. As in, Mars is a bit redder than in real life, and nebulae and the like emit x- and gamma-rays and the like, which they dab some colour on, etc... is that what you mean, or you mean full-on CGI out of thin air?

I'd love to see the full video, too. Unable to find it, though :( Space X certainly haven't put it up.
 
Eriku said:
I knew they enhanced them. As in, Mars is a bit redder than in real life, and nebulae and the like emit x- and gamma-rays and the like, which they dab some colour on, etc... is that what you mean, or you mean full-on CGI out of thin air?

I'd love to see the full video, too. Unable to find it, though :( Space X certainly haven't put it up.
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Yes full on CGI for many of the images, there are only actually a couple of real photos of earth apparently and who knows of they are even real. If you google NASA CGI it will probably explain things or even google for "real pictures of earth" or "photos of satellites in space" and you will find most of them are CGI. Many of the CGI images of earth have the countries and continents being completely different sizes from previous images.
 
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Eriku said:
Well, the amount of curvature you see has to do with the kind of lense they used, I believe. It's probably a less dramatic curvature, but they are clearly outside the atmosphere.

edit: WAIT! Youtube vid says "sped up"... I wanna see the original!
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MrMarcello said:
Definitely looks time elapsed.

Also seems more of a reversed takeoff.
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BringNaniBack said:
This. Need to see the real speed version as it looks incredibly fake at that speed.
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Eriku said:
Are people implying fake footage from Space X?

And MrMarcello, they themselves state in the youtube video that it's sped up.
Click to expand...

BringNaniBack said:
Not implying it's fake but most images from the likes of NASA etc are CGI rather than real photos or videos which they admit themselves, so it would be good to see this Space X video in real time.
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Eriku said:
I knew they enhanced them. As in, Mars is a bit redder than in real life, and nebulae and the like emit x- and gamma-rays and the like, which they dab some colour on, etc... is that what you mean, or you mean full-on CGI out of thin air?

I'd love to see the full video, too. Unable to find it, though :( Space X certainly haven't put it up.
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BringNaniBack said:
Yes full on CGI for many of the images, there are only actually a couple of real photos of earth apparently and who knows of they are even real. If you google NASA CGI it will probably explain things or even google for "real pictures of earth" or "photos of satellites in space" and you will find most of them are CGI. Many of the CGI images of earth have the countries and continents being completely different sizes from previous images.
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It must have been a wind up weekend.
 
rcoobc said:
It must have been a wind up weekend.
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Not from my posts. Most images of space are CGI which NASA admits. Doesn't mean all of the images are fake but read up about it and you will see most of the images released are not genuine photos.
 
BringNaniBack said:
Not from my posts. Most images of space are CGI which NASA admits. Doesn't mean all of the images are fake but read up about it and you will see most of the images released are not genuine photos.
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Oh no, you are entirely correct that there are a lot of compilation, re-colourised and CGI images released by NASA.... but I don't see the relevancy here. We are talking about SpaceX landing a rocket on a barge (something they have done 4 times now!) but when stiff likes this gets posted, it's descending into conspiracy bollocks territory, in which case, kindly take it to another thread
Also seems more of a reversed takeoff.
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looks incredibly fake
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who knows of they are even real.
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Just take it to another thread if you want to descend into conspiracy.
 
If you want to talk the how and why NASA recolourise images, then sure we can do that.

There are three main reasons:

1) NASA didn't use a traditional camera, (and their cameras may not have colour at all)
NASA's interest in any object goes far beyond the spectrum useful for human sight. Often they will be taking pictures from past the ultraviolet range to past the infrared. As there often is no "original" image, this makes their choice of what to do a bit easier; and their moral obligation to display things properly is gone. The only way they can display that infrormation is by remapping the colours passed the human visible range, back to those colours that we can actually see. See: Are the colors in Hubble images real?

Hubble doesn't use color film — in fact, it doesn't use film at all. Rather, its cameras record light from the universe with special electronic detectors. These detectors produce images of the cosmos not in color, but in shades of black and white....

We use color:

• To depict how an object might look to us if our eyes were as powerful as Hubble
• To visualize features of an object that would ordinarily be invisible to the human eye
• To bring out an object's subtle details.
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2) NASA are trying to highlight certain aspects of a picture

NASA may wish to display more information on its pictures by highlighting certain features. I believe the brine water found on this surface of mars was found by a guy called Lujendra Ojha who realised that, when he colourised the pictures taken in the spring, there were dark streaks, but in the winter they were gone (might be a different guy, can't find the story).

3) NASA are trying to display something as it would have been seen on earth. (i.e. what colour is an object anyway)
This is a rather specific and odd one, but is something that NASA has to think about. We are used to the colours of Earth, and the colours of Earth light. But even on earth, the colours change all the time. When it's cloudy, things get darker and greyer, when the sun is high or low. On other planets, it's the same. If you ever see one picture of Mars which makes Mars look quite dark, and another image of Mars that makes Mars look quite red, which is correct? Why not both. It could be that one was taken when the sun was on the horizon, and another when the sun was at its peak. And both would be wrong for any rocks taken back to earth from Mars. Should NASA display a landscape as it would be seen from Earth, or should they try and try to get as close as they can to a natural mars colour.

And an extra one) NASA are trying to augment a picture with more info

Like a goegraphers map, they may be using red = high, blue = low, or red = hot, blue = cold, etc. These pictures are probably obvious though.

But none of this is anything to do with Space X
 
BringNaniBack said:
Not from my posts. Most images of space are CGI which NASA admits. Doesn't mean all of the images are fake but read up about it and you will see most of the images released are not genuine photos.
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What's this got to do with SpaceX
 
rcoobc said:
What's this got to do with SpaceX
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Nothing really I was just responded to your post where you quoted me and others saying "It must have been a wind up weekend." Part of what you quoted was me talking about CGI images so I was just confirming that my post wasn't a wind up.

Although the discussion did start with people questioning the spaceX video so who knows if they don't also use some sort of CGI if many other space images and videos do, that is probably why I mentioned CGI. I'm interested to see the SpaceX video in real time rather than the sped up version.
 
SpaceX definitely dropped the ball a bit with that video. Speeding it up is fine, but they cut out a lot of it too (probably because some of the data didn't send).
 
Feck Mars, after seeing Europa Report I want us to send a drone to Europa.
 
SwansonsTache said:
Feck Mars, after seeing Europa Report I want us to send a drone to Europa.
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We definitely need to visit Europa.

I used to much prefer thinking about Europa or Enceladus (most likely to have life) or even Ganymede, Callisto and Titan. But I've recently come round to thinking heavily about Mars.

Mars might actually be the best place for human life in our solar system outside of Earth.

Mars has at least 50% protection from radiation compared to space (the planet blocks out half of it).
Mars has a gravity of approximately 2.6x less than Earths at the surface, enough to prevent the weightless nasties such as loss of bone density, problems with their eyes, and so on.
We might be able to bloody grow food on Mars
We might be able get oxygen and water from Mars.

The first 20 years would be the hardest
 
rcoobc said:
We definitely need to visit Europa.

I used to much prefer thinking about Europa or Enceladus (most likely to have life) or even Ganymede, Callisto and Titan. But I've recently come round to thinking heavily about Mars.

Mars might actually be the best place for human life in our solar system outside of Earth.

Mars has at least 50% protection from radiation compared to space (the planet blocks out half of it).
Mars has a gravity of approximately 2.6x less than Earths at the surface, enough to prevent the weightless nasties such as loss of bone density, problems with their eyes, and so on.
We might be able to bloody grow food on Mars
We might be able get oxygen and water from Mars.

The first 20 years would be the hardest
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When it comes to growing food and surviving on Mars, The Martian is actually quite an interesting read. Has quite a few interesting ideas on how to get around problems there. Of course I'm no biologist so no idea how realistic they are, but they sounded good to me.

We need to just expand on our ability to travel in space completely. Sending one mission out at a time is taking a long time for us to map even our nearest planets/moons. If Hawking is to be believed, we're taking too long about it.
 
rcoobc said:
We definitely need to visit Europa.

I used to much prefer thinking about Europa or Enceladus (most likely to have life) or even Ganymede, Callisto and Titan. But I've recently come round to thinking heavily about Mars.

Mars might actually be the best place for human life in our solar system outside of Earth.

Mars has at least 50% protection from radiation compared to space (the planet blocks out half of it).
Mars has a gravity of approximately 2.6x less than Earths at the surface, enough to prevent the weightless nasties such as loss of bone density, problems with their eyes, and so on.
We might be able to bloody grow food on Mars
We might be able get oxygen and water from Mars.

The first 20 years would be the hardest
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Agreed, for sustaining human life Mars are far better than Europa. Europa is to far away, and also the radiation is a total killer there.

But as far as finding life, even if just in microbial form I think Europa with it's wast sea is our best bet. Also the eruptions you see happening on Europa means there are seismic \ volcanic activity under the ice which means that microbes can survive like they do on earth.

How can we get oxygen from Mars without completely terraforming it btw? I wonder if there are plants that can be genetically modified to survive on Mars. I reckon the dust storms would kill them all off though.

Edit: http://www.cnet.com/news/leaf-on-mars-could-we-grow-a-garden-on-the-red-planet/
 
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SwansonsTache said:
How can we get oxygen from Mars without completely terraforming it btw? I wonder if there are plants that can be genetically modified to survive on Mars. I reckon the dust storms would kill them all off though.
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I'm not sure to be honest.

In 'The Martian' I believe the MAV made it, although I can't really remember how.

But I think you've basically got two options; use a pump to concentrate the martian atmosphere and then convert that CO2 to O2 using algea / plants / other, or take it from the soil using algea / plants / other

But it seems like it is possible:

https://www.quora.com/How-can-we-create-an-oxygen-environment-on-mars
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencet...bacteria-algae-help-support-human-colony.html
http://sciencenordic.com/scientists-are-trying-brew-oxygen-mars
http://space.stackexchange.com/questions/5094/how-do-you-make-oxygen-on-mars

That 2020 Rover seems like it will turn CO2 to O2 plus CO using energy plus a zirconia catalyst

MOXIE -- short for Mars OXygen In situ resource utilization Experiment -- was selected from 58 instrument proposals submitted by research teams around the world. The experiment, currently scheduled to launch in the summer of 2020, is a specialized reverse fuel cell whose primary function is to consume electricity in order to produce oxygen on Mars, where the atmosphere is 96 percent carbon dioxide. If proven to work on the Mars 2020 mission, a MOXIE-like system could later be used to produce oxygen on a larger scale, both for life-sustaining activities for human travelers and to provide liquid oxygen needed to burn the rocket fuel for a return trip to Earth.
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Obviously we can recycle the O2 -> CO2 we breath using plants anyway,
 
SwansonsTache said:
Agreed, for sustaining human life Mars are far better than Europa. Europa is to far away, and also the radiation is a total killer there.

But as far as finding life, even if just in microbial form I think Europa with it's wast sea is our best bet. Also the eruptions you see happening on Europa means there are seismic \ volcanic activity under the ice which means that microbes can survive like they do on earth.

How can we get oxygen from Mars without completely terraforming it btw? I wonder if there are plants that can be genetically modified to survive on Mars. I reckon the dust storms would kill them all off though.

Edit: http://www.cnet.com/news/leaf-on-mars-could-we-grow-a-garden-on-the-red-planet/
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The cold is the problem when temperatures plunge to -100 F at night around the equator - which I'm assuming that's where they are going to land.
When we went to the moon for the first time I was a kid and I was fascinated and watched on TV for hours, my dad didn't care about the mission and was furious the TV was showing only the Apollo mission (we had only 2 channels in 1969), can't wait when we go to mars because my DVR would be working 24 hours a day :lol:
 
barros said:
I saw yesterday a show about spacex and the trip to mars and is going to be really risky, not when they get there but to get there since they are using the 1 month window when mars is closer to earth, if they miss the red planet they are doomed.
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That wouldn't necessarily be the case, although could be a decision they choose.

Any trip to Mars will probably use a free return trajectory. So after the ship his finished accelerating from earths orbit, it will continue unaided on it's way to Mars, and unless something changes, it will swing round Mars and come back to Earth 2 years later. This is what was used in the Apollo missions to the moon, and helped save Apollo 13.

The 1.5 years back to Earth which be much much worse than the 0.5 years on the way to Mars though. Psychologically, physically, emotionally. Everything would be much harder.

If you were certain that your engines would fire or had redundancy and you knew other essential equipment would be okay after the first 0.5 years, you probably wouldn't use a free return trajectory. Maybe that is what the show is talking about, a route with a lower delta-v cost.
 
rcoobc said:
I'm not sure to be honest.

In 'The Martian' I believe the MAV made it, although I can't really remember how.

But I think you've basically got two options; use a pump to concentrate the martian atmosphere and then convert that CO2 to O2 using algea / plants / other, or take it from the soil using algea / plants / other

But it seems like it is possible:

https://www.quora.com/How-can-we-create-an-oxygen-environment-on-mars
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencet...bacteria-algae-help-support-human-colony.html
http://sciencenordic.com/scientists-are-trying-brew-oxygen-mars
http://space.stackexchange.com/questions/5094/how-do-you-make-oxygen-on-mars

That 2020 Rover seems like it will turn CO2 to O2 plus CO using energy plus a zirconia catalyst



Obviously we can recycle the O2 -> CO2 we breath using plants anyway,
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Mars has water and they believe the soil has some so they would have to dig a bit, extract dirt and heat the dirt to extract any water (they are doing this in Utah with the Mars program group which I forgot the name).
 
Apollo 13 Free Return Trajectory

apollo-13-nominal-mission-profile-580x310.jpg


Earth Mars Free Return Trajectory - This graphic suggest a round trip of 501 days is possible

022713_traj.jpg
 
rcoobc said:
That wouldn't necessarily be the case, although could be a decision they choose.

Any trip to Mars will probably use a free return trajectory. So after the ship his finished accelerating from earths orbit, it will continue unaided on it's way to Mars, and unless something changes, it will swing round Mars and come back to Earth 2 years later. This is what was used in the Apollo missions to the moon, and helped save Apollo 13.

The 1.5 years back to Earth which be much much worse than the 0.5 years on the way to Mars though. Psychologically, physically, emotionally. Everything would be much harder.

If you were certain that your engines would fire or had redundancy and you knew other essential equipment would be okay after the first 0.5 years, you probably wouldn't use a free return trajectory. Maybe that is what the show is talking about, a route with a lower delta-v cost.
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They show the 1 month window then they have to stay 1.5 years in mars and come back again using the 1 month window, they should build a spacecraft like the one in the movie mars, bigger and with more supplies and room and an artificial gravity which would be a must if one day we go to Europa.
 
barros said:
They show the 1 month window then they have to stay 1.5 years in mars and come back again using the 1 month window, they should build a spacecraft like the one in the movie mars, bigger and with more supplies and room and an artificial gravity which would be a must if one day we go to Europa.
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Oh I see.

Yeah, basically that's it. Once you've launched, you can stay on Mars for 1.5 years and then come back, but then you only have a 1 month window to come back on, otherwise it's another 2 years wait... And if you haven't had resupplies, then you are basically in "the Martian" situation.

I wouldn't bother with artificial gravity. We've survived with 2 year stints on the ISS and the MIR since 1986. They have those pulley systems now to do simulated weight training. But for Europa we would absolutely need it.

I think the biggest question is, do you assemble the Earth-Mars ship in orbit, or just launch one big rocket to Mars. Musk seems to want to the latter, which gives a Delta V saving, and is much much cheaper. NASA wants to do the former, because it's safer and more comfortable.
 
I think in 50 years time, we could see ISS sized "motherships" on very slow "mars cycler" trajectories going to Mars and back, requiring only small delta-v changes to continuously go to and from each planet

Then you launch your rockets as usual, and whilst they would still require the same delta-v that you need to get to Mars, you save as you don't need to build (or accelerate) the whole ship, just get the capsule including the crew and it's supplies up to the mothership.

Then the crew travel to and from Mars in relative luxury.
 
rcoobc said:
I think in 50 years time, we could see ISS sized "motherships" on very slow "mars cycler" trajectories going to Mars and back, requiring only small delta-v changes to continuously go to and from each planet

Then you launch your rockets as usual, and whilst they would still require the same delta-v that you need to get to Mars, you save as you don't need to build (or accelerate) the whole ship, just get the capsule including the crew and it's supplies up to the mothership.

Then the crew travel to and from Mars in relative luxury.
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I'd never heard of that before but it sounds like a great idea. For me though, the big question remains: what do you do on Mars when you get there? what's the point?

Once you've established the existence/non-existence of life, it's a pretty dull planet - no football, pubs, night life or little green women.
 
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